Things I Love: Other Bloggers

You’ve heard of “Follow Friday” on Twitter, right? For those unfamiliar with Twitter, “Follow Friday” is your chance to share with other people on Twitter your favorite Tweeters. Maybe you love your fitness coach, your OB-GYN office, or your home builder and you really enjoy their Tweets. Maybe you don’t reTweet stuff, often, but you really look forward to certain Tweets for whatever reason. Perhaps your favorite person on Twitter sends out some great parenting or health tips. Maybe someone else Tweets out clever quotes? Basically, for whatever reason you like following a particular person or brand on Twitter, you Tweet out to your followers a message with hashtag-FF (#FF) and because these people follow you, maybe they’ll follow your friend or your favorite Tweeter.

It’s a great courtesy. And just because I decide on one particular Friday to #FF (follow-Friday) three or four Mommy Bloggers that my sister follows, it doesn’t mean I have to follow them forever. However, maybe I’ll find these new Tweeters interesting or funny, or they’ll have a really creative blog, which is exactly the type of person I like to follow on Twitter.

Does this make sense to those of you who’d never heard of it? For those of you familiar with the #FF thing, did I explain it right?

Anyway, each Sunday, I’m going to start my own awesome tradition …”Share it Sunday.” I write for 5 blogs, and follow dozens of others, and read all different blogs all the time. It’s inspiring. Sometimes you sit there blogging and wonder, “why am I doing this? who cares? nobody reads, anyway.” But remember, you’re probably not blogging in order to get 100,000 readers. You’re blogging because you (a) love writing and (b) love whatever topic you happen to be writing about.

This is my sister. Even if she wasn’t my sister, I think I’d love her blog. Maybe I don’t try any of the recipes, and maybe I can’t run 1,000 miles each week like she does, but it’s fun to see what motivates her and keeps her running and eating healthy. As far as a Mom Blog goes, hers is exactly what a Mom Blog should look like and sound like. She’s cool because she said at the beginning of the year she was going to start blogging, and unlike so many people who start and then sputter out, she’s there every dang day.

I met Kurt at a bloggers club here in Detroit. I love his blog because sometimes I forget about certain bands I have hidden away in my massive collection of MP3s and this guy reminds me to, hey, listen to some Buddy Guy or, hey, I’ve never heard of Cherie Currie, and then I got check ’em out on YouTube. Occasionally, I actually go and buy their music. Plus, it’s nice to see a guy like me, in his 40s, who refuses to grow up and become lame and boring.

I’ve been writing various stuff for 6 years. My writing is on again, off again, at times, but when I ran across Rochelle Melander, aka The Write Now Coach, I started writing more consistently, writing without fear, experimenting a little more, and basically with a ton more inspiration. She’s there in my email every week with tips and advice, she does monthly interviews with authors and writers who, I feel, are just like you and me. It’s part of her Always Write! series. Visit her site and you can listen to many archived interviews. If you want to write, and maybe you need help, check her out.

There you have it. Is it a cop out for a Sunday blog entry? Is it a shameless attempt to have other bloggers talk about me, or share my work? Is it a veiled lesson to my writing clients about how to use Twitter?

All of the above. Thanks for reading. Your readership inspires me. And if you wished you knew what I eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, then you should follow @donkowalewski.